Where will the conference take place?

The conference will be held in Melbourne, AUS.

What is the primary focus of ICPHRIS-2026?

The conference focuses on peacekeeping, human rights, and international security, aiming to foster discussion and collaboration among experts in these fields.

International Conference on Peacekeeping, Human Rights, and International Security (ICPHRIS-2026)

Name: International Conference on Peacekeeping, Human Rights, and International Security (ICPHRIS-2026)
Start: 2026-10-08T00:00:00Z
End: 2026-10-09T00:00:00Z
Location: Dublin

Oct 8–9, 2026Dublin, IrelandIn-person

Registration open

The International Conference on Peacekeeping, Human Rights, and International Security (ICPHRIS-2026) is set to convene in Melbourne, Australia. This event provides a critical forum for academics, researchers, and practitioners to discuss contemporary challenges and advancements in these interconnected fields. Participants will engage with cutting-edge research and explore practical solutions to foster global peace and security. The conference aims to bridge theoretical insights with practical applications, encouraging a multidisciplinary approach to complex global issues. It offers a unique opportunity for networking and collaboration among experts dedicated to upholding human rights, enhancing peacekeeping operations, and strengthening international security frameworks.

Committees & topics

Topics
The Future of UN Peacekeeping Operations · The Global Human Rights Framework Under Strain · International Security in an Era of Multipolar Competition · Interdisciplinary Approaches to Global Crises · Mechanisms for Conflict Resolution and Mediation · Addressing Organized and Political Violence Worldwide · The Evolution and Drawdown of UN Missions · Contemporary Armed Conflicts and International Response

Why it matters

In an increasingly complex global landscape, the intersection of peacekeeping, human rights, and international security remains a cornerstone of stable international relations. This conference is particularly pertinent as it addresses the evolving nature of conflicts, the persistent challenges to human dignity, and the imperative for effective multilateral responses. The discussions in Melbourne will contribute to a deeper understanding of how these elements interact and influence global stability.

The event's focus on these themes is crucial for several reasons. Firstly, effective peacekeeping operations are often predicated on a robust understanding and respect for human rights, which can prevent escalation and foster long-term peace. Secondly, international security is not merely the absence of war but also the presence of justice and human protection. The conference will explore how these concepts can be integrated into policy and practice.

Furthermore, the gathering in AUS provides a platform for diverse perspectives, including those from nations actively involved in peacekeeping missions and those grappling with internal security challenges. This exchange of ideas is vital for developing comprehensive strategies that are both globally relevant and locally adaptable. By bringing together a wide array of stakeholders, ICPHRIS-2026 seeks to inform policy, inspire research, and ultimately contribute to a more secure and just world.

How to prepare

Delegates preparing for ICPHRIS-2026 should consider the multifaceted nature of peacekeeping, human rights, and international security. A strong understanding of the historical context of these fields, as well as current geopolitical trends, will be essential. Familiarity with various peacekeeping mandates, international human rights law, and the mechanisms of international security cooperation will allow for more meaningful engagement.

Participants are encouraged to review case studies of successful and challenging peacekeeping missions, analyze the impact of human rights violations on regional stability, and examine emerging threats to international security, such as cyber warfare and climate-induced conflicts. Understanding the roles of different international organizations and national actors in these domains will also be beneficial. Consider how frameworks like the "Action for Peacekeeping" initiative are shaping current operations.

To maximize their contribution, attendees should also reflect on the ethical dilemmas inherent in interventions and protection efforts. Engaging with concepts such as "Hidden Stakeholders" and applying "Dynamic Analysis" to conflict situations can provide valuable insights. Preparing to discuss specific regional challenges and potential innovative solutions will enhance the collaborative spirit of the conference. For those presenting research, ensuring that their work addresses practical implications and policy recommendations will be particularly impactful.

Country perspectives

Where the most-relevant 5 countries stand on the core issues in play. Click through for the full country profile.

Australia

As the host nation, AUS is likely to emphasize its commitment to multilateralism, regional security in Oceania, and its contributions to international peacekeeping efforts.

Role in topic

AUS has a history of contributing troops and resources to UN peacekeeping missions and plays an active role in regional security dialogues. Its perspective will likely highlight the importance of international cooperation and adherence to international law in maintaining peace and protecting human rights, particularly in the Indo-Pacific region.

United States

The USA will likely focus on its leadership role in global security, counter-terrorism efforts, and the promotion of democratic values as integral to human rights and peace.

Role in topic

The USA is a major contributor to international security initiatives and peacekeeping operations, often providing significant logistical and financial support. Its perspective will likely underscore the importance of robust security frameworks, strategic alliances, and addressing root causes of conflict while advocating for human rights globally.

China

CHN may emphasize its non-interference policy, its growing role in UN peacekeeping, and the importance of national sovereignty in discussions of human rights and security.

Role in topic

CHN has increased its participation in UN peacekeeping missions and is a significant global actor in international security. Its perspective will likely focus on the principles of state sovereignty and non-interference, while also highlighting its contributions to global stability through economic development and multilateral engagement.

France

FRA will likely advocate for strong European cooperation on security and defense, the protection of human rights, and effective multilateral responses to global crises.

Role in topic

FRA is a permanent member of the UN Security Council and a key player in European security. Its perspective will likely emphasize the importance of a strong international legal framework, the protection of civilian populations in conflict zones, and the need for coordinated international action to address security threats and human rights abuses.

India

IND will likely highlight its extensive contributions to UN peacekeeping, its commitment to human rights, and the challenges of maintaining security in diverse and complex regions.

Role in topic

IND has been one of the largest troop contributors to UN peacekeeping missions for decades. Its perspective will likely draw on its vast experience in diverse operational environments, emphasizing the practical challenges of peacekeeping, the importance of capacity building, and the need for a comprehensive approach to human rights protection in conflict-affected areas.

Topics & background

The background behind each topic and the actors that shape it.

The Future of UN Peacekeeping Operations

UN peacekeeping emerged in 1948 with UNTSO in the Middle East and expanded dramatically after the Cold War, evolving from lightly armed observer missions into complex multidimensional operations tasked with civilian protection, disarmament, and statebuilding. The failures of the 1990s — Rwanda, Srebrenica, and Somalia — prompted reforms including the 2000 Brahimi Report and the 2015 HIPPO review, which emphasized primacy of politics, protection of civilians, and partnerships with regional organizations such as the African Union. Today, peacekeeping faces a contraction. Major missions including MINUSMA in Mali (closed 2023) and MONUSCO in the DRC (drawdown ongoing) have been forced out by host governments increasingly aligned with private military contractors or rival powers. Persistent challenges include sexual exploitation and abuse by personnel, asymmetric threats from jihadist insurgencies, chronic underfunding, and political deadlock on the Security Council that blocks new mandates. The 2024 Pact for the Future and the Secretary-General's New Agenda for Peace call for a fundamental rethinking of when and how blue helmets are deployed. The core debate concerns whether peacekeeping should retreat to traditional ceasefire monitoring, adapt to counterterrorism realities, or pivot toward smaller political missions and regional partnerships with assessed UN funding.

Key players

The Global Human Rights Framework Under Strain

The modern human rights regime was built on the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights and codified through the 1966 International Covenants on Civil and Political Rights and on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. The architecture expanded with treaty bodies, the 1993 Vienna Declaration, the creation of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, and the 2006 establishment of the Human Rights Council with its Universal Periodic Review mechanism. In recent years the framework has come under sustained pressure. Authoritarian consolidation, mass atrocity allegations in Xinjiang, Myanmar, Gaza, Sudan, and Ukraine, and the weaponization of digital surveillance have outpaced enforcement tools. The Council itself faces credibility questions over the membership of states with poor records, and the United States has repeatedly withdrawn and rejoined. Emerging issues — generative AI and algorithmic discrimination, climate displacement following GA Resolution 76/300 recognizing the right to a healthy environment, and the rights of LGBTQ+ persons — are stretching the interpretation of existing instruments. The central dispute is between universalist enforcement and claims of cultural relativism or sovereignty, alongside the practical question of whether monitoring and naming mechanisms can produce compliance without coercive tools.

Key players

International Security in an Era of Multipolar Competition

The post-1945 international security order was anchored on the UN Charter's prohibition on the use of force, collective security through the Security Council, and a layered arms control architecture including the NPT, the CWC, and bilateral US-Russian strategic agreements. The post-Cold War unipolar moment is now decisively over, replaced by intensified competition between the United States, China, and Russia, with rising middle powers asserting strategic autonomy. Key arms control treaties have collapsed or are eroding: the INF Treaty ended in 2019, Russia suspended New START participation in 2023, and the Open Skies Treaty unraveled. Simultaneously, new domains — cyber, outer space, and artificial intelligence — lack binding norms, with the UN Open-Ended Working Group on ICTs and the GGE on lethal autonomous weapons systems producing reports but no treaties. Active hot conflicts in Ukraine, Gaza, Sudan, and tensions over Taiwan and the South China Sea compound proliferation risks, including renewed nuclear modernization by all P5 states and concerns over Iran and North Korea. The core challenge before delegates is whether existing institutions can be adapted to manage this competition or whether new frameworks are required to prevent escalation across interconnected domains.

Key players

Interdisciplinary Approaches to Global Crises

Contemporary security and humanitarian challenges increasingly defy single-discipline solutions. Climate change drives displacement and resource conflict; pandemics expose the fragility of supply chains and trigger geopolitical recrimination, as seen with COVID-19; artificial intelligence simultaneously raises labor, rights, security, and disinformation concerns. The UN system has responded with cross-cutting frameworks such as the Sustainable Development Goals (2015), the Sendai Framework on Disaster Risk Reduction, the WHO Pandemic Agreement negotiations, and the Secretary-General's 2023 New Agenda for Peace, which explicitly frames climate, technology, and inequality as security issues. Despite this conceptual integration, institutional silos persist. The Security Council has resisted formally treating climate change as a threat to international peace and security after a 2021 draft resolution was vetoed by Russia. Humanitarian, development, and peace actors — the so-called HDP nexus — struggle to coordinate funding and mandates on the ground in protracted crises from the Sahel to Yemen. The interdisciplinary question is whether the UN architecture can move beyond its functional divisions to address compound risks, and how to allocate authority among the General Assembly, ECOSOC, the Security Council, and specialized agencies.

Key players

Mechanisms for Conflict Resolution and Mediation

Chapter VI of the UN Charter obliges states to seek pacific settlement of disputes through negotiation, mediation, arbitration, and judicial means including the International Court of Justice. Over the decades a dense ecosystem has emerged: UN good offices, the Department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs, regional bodies such as the African Union, ECOWAS, the OSCE, and the Arab League, and a growing role for non-state mediators including the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue and the Crisis Group. The last decade has seen a marked decline in negotiated settlements. According to peace research datasets, fewer civil wars now end through agreement than at any point since the 1990s, with conflicts in Syria, Libya, Yemen, Ukraine, and Sudan stalemated or escalating. Multi-track diplomacy faces fragmentation among competing external sponsors, the rise of transactional powers willing to support military victories, and erosion of trust in third-party guarantees. The 2018 Singapore Communiqué on North Korea and the 2020 Doha agreement on Afghanistan illustrate both the possibilities and the fragility of mediated outcomes. Delegates must consider how to revitalize mediation capacities, strengthen the role of women and civil society under Resolution 1325, and reconcile justice imperatives — including ICC indictments — with the pragmatic compromises that negotiated settlements often demand.

Key players

Addressing Organized and Political Violence Worldwide

Lethal violence today extends far beyond declared interstate war. UNODC data show that homicide claims more lives annually than armed conflict and terrorism combined, with Latin America and the Caribbean experiencing the world's highest rates driven by organized crime. Gender-based violence remains pervasive globally, addressed through CEDAW and the 1993 Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women but persistently underprosecuted. Terrorism, while declining in overall fatalities since its 2014 peak, has shifted geographically to the Sahel, which now accounts for the majority of global terror deaths. The UN framework spans Sustainable Development Goal 16 on peace, justice, and strong institutions; the Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy reviewed biennially; the UN Convention against Transnational Organized Crime; and the Women, Peace and Security agenda anchored in Resolution 1325. Yet enforcement is fragmented across agencies, and rising authoritarianism has produced concerns that counterterrorism and anti-gang measures are being used to suppress dissent and erode due process. The central tension is how to confront violence in its many forms — criminal, political, gendered, and state-perpetrated — without sacrificing the human rights protections that distinguish legitimate state action from the violence it seeks to prevent.

Key players

The Evolution and Drawdown of UN Missions

Since 1948 the United Nations has deployed more than 70 peacekeeping and special political missions, ranging from observer groups in Kashmir (UNMOGIP) and the Middle East (UNTSO) to large multidimensional operations in the Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan, and Mali. The post-Cold War expansion brought ambitious mandates encompassing civilian protection, electoral support, security sector reform, and statebuilding, financed through a separate assessed peacekeeping budget that peaked above nine billion dollars in 2015. The current era is one of consolidation and contested withdrawal. MINUSMA was terminated in 2023 at the demand of Mali's transitional authorities; MONUSCO is drawing down in the DRC amid hostile public opinion; UNMISS in South Sudan and MINURSO in Western Sahara face stalemated political processes; and UNIFIL's role in southern Lebanon has been tested by the 2023–2024 escalation. Host-state consent, once assumed, is now routinely weaponized. Meanwhile special political missions like UNAMA in Afghanistan and UNSMIL in Libya operate in environments where the underlying political settlement has collapsed. Delegates must address how missions are mandated, financed, evaluated, and exited; whether the AU Peace Support Operations framework with predictable UN assessed contributions (Resolution 2719, 2023) can supplement or replace traditional peacekeeping; and how to safeguard civilians during transitions.

Key players

Contemporary Armed Conflicts and International Response

The number of active armed conflicts is at its highest level since the Second World War, according to Uppsala Conflict Data Program figures, with more than 55 state-based conflicts recorded in recent years. The Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 returned large-scale interstate war to Europe and shattered post-Cold War assumptions about territorial inviolability. The October 2023 Hamas attacks and the subsequent war in Gaza have produced one of the gravest humanitarian crises of the century and prompted ICJ proceedings under the Genocide Convention. Sudan's war between the SAF and RSF since April 2023 has created the world's largest displacement crisis, while conflicts persist in Myanmar, Yemen, the eastern DRC, the Sahel, and Ethiopia's contested aftermath of the Tigray war. International humanitarian law, codified in the four Geneva Conventions and their Additional Protocols, faces erosion through deliberate targeting of civilians, hospitals, and aid workers, and through impunity for violations. The Security Council has been paralyzed by repeated vetoes on Ukraine, Gaza, and Syria, prompting greater reliance on the General Assembly's Uniting for Peace mechanism, the ICJ, and the ICC. Arms transfers, sanctions evasion, and the involvement of private military companies further complicate response. Delegates must weigh how to enforce IHL, sustain humanitarian access, address accountability, and revive deterrence against territorial aggression in an environment of fractured great-power consensus.

Key players

Resources

News, lessons, and country profiles to prep for International Conference on Peacekeeping, Human Rights, and International Security (ICPHRIS-2026).

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Lessons

Bite-sized lessons to build the basics

Hidden Stakeholders

Engagement Strategies

Dynamic Analysis

Stakeholder Mapping Workshop

Courses

Guided courses that go deeper on the topic

Conflict Resolution

Advanced Negotiation

Multilateral Negotiation

Policy Brief Writing

Ireland October 2026

By committee

Frequently asked questions

International Conference on Peacekeeping, Human Rights, and International Security (ICPHRIS-2026)

Oct 8–9, 2026Dublin, IrelandIn-person

Registration open

Committees & topics

Topics
The Future of UN Peacekeeping Operations · The Global Human Rights Framework Under Strain · International Security in an Era of Multipolar Competition · Interdisciplinary Approaches to Global Crises · Mechanisms for Conflict Resolution and Mediation · Addressing Organized and Political Violence Worldwide · The Evolution and Drawdown of UN Missions · Contemporary Armed Conflicts and International Response

Why it matters

How to prepare

Country perspectives

Where the most-relevant 5 countries stand on the core issues in play. Click through for the full country profile.

Australia

As the host nation, AUS is likely to emphasize its commitment to multilateralism, regional security in Oceania, and its contributions to international peacekeeping efforts.

Role in topic

United States

The USA will likely focus on its leadership role in global security, counter-terrorism efforts, and the promotion of democratic values as integral to human rights and peace.

Role in topic

China

CHN may emphasize its non-interference policy, its growing role in UN peacekeeping, and the importance of national sovereignty in discussions of human rights and security.

Role in topic

France

FRA will likely advocate for strong European cooperation on security and defense, the protection of human rights, and effective multilateral responses to global crises.

Role in topic

India

IND will likely highlight its extensive contributions to UN peacekeeping, its commitment to human rights, and the challenges of maintaining security in diverse and complex regions.

Role in topic